Microsoft Talk

BY MELISSA NEWMAN

EVERY YEAR, AMID the excitement of Halloween-related fun, conversations commonly turn toward scary and unnerving talk of the mysterious world of paranormal and supernatural phenomena. Unlike the entertaining “safe scares” that Halloween brings, for those who encounter “real paranormal phenomena,” the encounters can be truly terrifying and even life-changing.
Unlike the entertaining “safe scares” that Halloween brings, for those who encounter “real paranormal phenomena,” the encounters can be truly terrifying and even life-changing. And while these otherworldly phenomena have been a part of the human experience since the dawn of humankind – and, incidentally, is where Halloween originates – not even western society’s modern-day cynical culture of scientific analysis could dismiss and suppress the existence of these elusive phenomena. On the contrary, whether you are a believer or a hardened skeptic, an avalanche of experiences involving paranormal and supernatural phenomena continues to be reported worldwide.

According to several polls and surveys conducted around the world, belief in the paranormal and supernatural is at an all time high and shows no evidence of decline. In the U.S. alone, a recent Gallop poll showed that 75% of Americans have some sort of paranormal belief; a Harris poll showed that half of Americans believe in ghosts; a CBS poll showed that one in five Americans have seen or physically encountered a ghost; and still another survey taken from more than 400 college students with the highest GPAs found seniors and grad students more likely to believe in the paranormal then their “uneducated” freshman counterparts. Paranormal beliefs include such phenomena as extraterrestrial and UFO close encounters, all types of psychic phenomena, miracles and demonic possession, ghosts and poltergeists, witchcraft and metaphysics, and encounters with extraordinary life forms, including Bigfoot and the notorious chupacabra.

HALLOWEEN ORIGINS

Whether one is a believer or a skeptic, Halloween in the U.S. might be the one time of the year that both stand united in simply having a good time in the shadow of such reported phenomena. The origins of Halloween itself lay in supernatural beliefs and an ancient Celtic festival that dates back some 2,000 years. Originally called Samhain (pronounced sow-in), the festival originated amidst the region now known as the United Kingdom and celebrated the one night each year that the boundary between the worlds of the living and the dead became indistinguishable. On this night, the Celts believed that the ghosts of the dead returned to Earth for good or for bad and allowed Druid priests to additionally interact with them for the wellbeing of them all.

Over the course of hundreds of years, early Christianity would attempt to suppress and replace the Celtic festival with All Saints’ Day, which was celebrated on November 1, a holy day of obligation to honor saints and martyrs in the Christian faith. The celebration was also called All-hallows or All-hallowmas (from Middle English Alholowmesse meaning All Saints’ Day) and the night before it, the night of Samhain, began to be called All-hallows Eve and, eventually, Halloween. But even the powerful influence of the church was unable to squelch the supernatural festival, and Halloween endured and flourished over the centuries to become the sensationalistic celebration it is today in the U.S.

While Halloween is still mostly an American commercial phenomenon, little by little every year, evidence that the spooky holiday is being embraced globally is being seen more and more. UNICEF itself has a special “Trick-or-Treat for UNICEF” program aimed to empower kids, not just in the U.S., but in other countries as well, by trick-or-treating for donations to help their counter-parts in need all over the world. The reluctance to embrace Halloween in other countries has been primarily due to the seriousness that the supernatural and paranormal is taken in other cultures. While the western world can make light of beliefs, both religious and metaphysical, other old-world cultures are very sensitive to and deeply immersed in their beliefs and find such playfulness like the Amercanized version of Halloween to be considered as taboo and, in some cultures, even sacrilegious.

Enjoy your Halloween!

Microsoft focuses on simplifying core tasks such as data and identity management, allowing developers to spend more time creating innovative applications and user experiences.

Building a Foundation for Innovation

In September, Microsoft outlined their vision for Visual Studio 2010 and the .NET Framework 4.0 by describing five focus areas: Democratizing ALM (Application Lifecycle Management), Breakthrough Departmental Applications, Inspiring Developer Delight, Riding the Next Generation Platform Wave and Enabling Emerging Trends.

This week at PDC, the dialogue around those focus areas continues, with details on ways to make it easy for developers to use their existing Visual Studio and .NET skills to develop for “the cloud” – software that resides primarily on the web but spans the server, PC and mobile devices as well.

Microsoft also provided a deeper look at the next generation platform opportunities by announcing that Visual Studio 2010 will be optimized to help developers build Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 applications and take advantage of new Web development features.

These highlights build on a series of recent announcements about new technologies designed to help developers create new software experiences, including:

• New enhancements to the Windows Server application capabilities, including Windows Communication Foundation 4.0, Windows Workflow Foundation 4.0, and “Dublin” extensions to Windows Server.

• Visual Studio 2010 programming models for concisely expressing “concurrency,” or the ability for applications to efficiently run multiple instructions on a “multicore” or “manycore” processing chip, including new .NET Framework libraries such as the Task Parallel Library and Parallel LINQ, as well as the Parallel Pattern Library and Concurrency Runtime for developing native applications with C++.

• Ongoing investments in the .NET Framework through the addition of new functionality in Windows Communication Foundation (WCF) and Windows Workflow Foundation (WF). For cloud computing and services, the tools are available today as separate add-ons for Microsoft Visual Studio 2008 SP1 (Standard Edition or better), and for Microsoft Visual Web Developer 2008 Express Edition SP1. Support for Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 will be available in the near future.

According to Mendlen, the strategy is based on a high-level perspective of the development ecosystem, and the realization that the ultimate goal for every developer is to build engaging, practical new applications for end users.

“By working to make the process of developing simpler and more efficient, we’re empowering developers to focus on using the power of technology to address the needs of today’s marketplace,” he says.

New high-definition open standards-based video solution to enable higher-quality streaming media delivery over HTTP by adapting video quality on varying consumer connection speeds.

Microsoft Corp., the worldwide leader in software, services and solutions, and Akamai Technologies Inc., the leader in powering rich media, dynamic transactions and enterprise applications online, today announced plans to enable high-definition (HD) quality experiences on PCs. Akamai will release a beta version of a new service, powered by Windows Server 2008 and Microsoft Silverlight, to deliver rich Internet applications via the world’s largest HTTP edge network.

Microsoft is introducing new Web server technology, called Internet Information Services 7.0 (IIS7.0) Smooth Streaming, that gives consumers instant start-up times and no buffering by adapting the quality of the video stream in real time based upon changing connectivity speed. This enables companies to boost brand awareness and advertising revenues by extending average viewing times. They can also benefit from unprecedented network scalability using distributed HTTP-based Web servers.

“Smooth Streaming is an evolution of proven Silverlight technology that has powered global online events,” said Scott Guthrie, corporate vice president of the .NET Developer Division at Microsoft. “Our objective has always been to provide a platform that enables next-generation media experiences on the Web. Together with Akamai, we will take that a step further by offering a consistently superior adaptive streaming experience on a global scale.”

Akamai will be building upon this innovative technology with a new service, Akamai AdaptiveEdge Streaming for Microsoft Silverlight, which will be deployed across the company’s globally distributed network to bring a solution with HD scale to media companies worldwide. The service is expected to be available to select Akamai customers in a beta release in early 2009. Akamai AdaptiveEdge Streaming for Silverlight will leverage IIS Smooth Streaming, which offers a simple-to-manage approach for adaptive streaming, and will be an upcoming feature of IIS7 Media Pack. IIS7 Media Pack brings media-specific features such as bit-rate throttling and playlists to Web servers. This powerful solution is enhanced by the compelling experiences and rich interactive applications enabled by the Silverlight player.

“We’ve seen firsthand the growing demand for HD online content among our customer base,” said Tim Napoleon, chief strategist, Digital Media at Akamai. “In a broadcast model, typically the experience is consistent across 100 percent of the viewing audience. The challenge is that capabilities in the online world vary greatly for each user. Adaptive streaming allows the video to adjust to the audience, maximizing each user’s experience. We believe that this technology, combined with an open video player solution that embraces existing development and ad standards, will allow us to offer the scale and reach needed to grow the business of online video.”

“Users expect TV-quality video when they go online; anything less just doesn’t make the grade anymore,” said Will Richmond, broadband video analyst and editor/publisher of VideoNuze. “Especially in the HD era, premium video providers are recognizing that quality is king and as a result are accelerating their shift to more robust delivery infrastructure. And the payoffs are clear: higher-quality video drives longer viewing sessions, greater engagement and improved monetization opportunities.”

As part of a strategic companywide shift toward embracing web-based solutions, Microsoft today announced plans to deliver Office Web applications – lightweight versions of Office – through web browsers.

Q&A: Microsoft Senior Vice President Chris Capossela:

PressPass: How will the Office Web applications benefit customers?

Capossela: Customers’ requirements have changed, as have their expectations of technology. While Office is synonymous with desktop productivity, the idea of “desktop” has

changed from a PC-centric notion to one in which people are empowered on the PC, on the phone, and with a browser.

Our customers don’t use one device, but rather several. They want a seamless, synchronized experience across those devices to help them work smarter, faster, and better. Office Web applications will make that a reality.

PressPass: How will people receive Office Web applications?

Editing OneNote notes in OneNote Web application.
Click for hi-res version

Capossela: We will deliver Office Web applications to consumers through Office Live, which is a consumer service with both ad-funded and subscription offerings. For business customers, we will offer Office Web applications as a hosted subscription service and through existing volume licensing agreements.

We will show a private technology preview of the Office Web applications later this year. For more information about this and other details about the Office Web applications, people can sign up for Office Live Workspace at workspace.officelive.com.

PressPass: Why is Microsoft doing this?

Capossela: We are deeply committed to offering our customers the technology they need to succeed. To that end, we’re investing in software plus services for the long term, something that sets us apart from our competitors. Office Web applications complement the Office suite and Office Mobile applications and enable our customers to share and collaborate more effectively through the familiar Office experience.

Editing a Word document in Word Web application.
Click for hi-res version

We know our customers use their PC, phone, and browser in different situations depending on their needs. The browser is particularly important when you need to access and edit files while traveling, working remotely, or using someone else’s PC. Together, these new tools enable new styles of community-based collaboration where multiple people can contribute simultaneously to various work through the internet.

PressPass: Will your partners be able to take advantage of the shift to Web-based solutions?

Capossela: Over the years, thousands of partners have sold Microsoft Office to millions of customers worldwide. The opportunities for our partners will increase as we continue to innovate with Microsoft Office. This announcement does not change the way customers buy Office. The biggest opportunity for OEM and retail partners continues to be selling Office to help their customers get better results faster.

When available with the next version of Microsoft Office, Office Web applications will increase the opportunity for OEM and retail partners as they extend the value of Microsoft

Office to the Web, thereby addressing the full range of their customers’ needs.

Company releases comprehensive Azure Services Platform for the cloud, offering unprecedented power of choice and open connections for developers.

during a keynote speech at the Microsoft Professional Developers Conference 2008 (PDC2008), Ray Ozzie, Microsoft Corp.’s chief software architect, announced Windows Azure, the cloud-based service foundation underlying its Azure Services Platform, and highlighted this platform’s role in delivering a software plus services approach to computing. The Azure Services Platform is an industry-leading move by Microsoft to help developers build the next generation of applications that will span from the cloud to the enterprise datacenter and deliver compelling new experiences across the PC, Web and phone.

Ozzie described how this platform combines cloud-based developer capabilities with storage, computational and networking infrastructure services, all hosted on servers operating within Microsoft’s global datacenter network. This provides developers with the ability to deploy applications in the cloud or on-premises and enables experiences across a broad range of business and consumer scenarios. A limited community technology preview (CTP) of the Azure Services Platform was initially made available to developers in attendance at PDC2008, giving them a chance to try out its features and functions and plan for their own future development.

“Today marks a turning point for Microsoft and the development community,” Ozzie said. “We have introduced a game-changing set of technologies that will bring new opportunities to Web developers and business developers alike. The Azure Services Platform, built from the ground up to be consistent with Microsoft’s commitment to openness and interoperability, promises to transform the way businesses operate and how consumers access their information and experience the Web. Most important, it gives our customers the power of choice to deploy applications in cloud-based Internet services or through on-premises servers, or to combine them in any way that makes the most sense for the needs of their business.”

Empowering Cloud Development With the Azure Services Platform

Unlike many of today’s service-based solutions, the Azure Services Platform provides developers with the flexibility and ability to create applications while taking advantage of their existing skills, tools and technologies such as the Microsoft .NET Framework and Visual Studio. Developers also can choose from a broad range of commercial or open source development tools and technologies, and access the Azure Services Platform using a variety of common Internet standards including HTTP, representational state transfer (REST), WS-* and Atom Publishing Protocol (AtomPub).

Key components of the Azure Services Platform include the following:

• Windows Azure for service hosting and management, low-level scalable storage, computation and networking

• Microsoft SQL Services for a wide range of database services and reporting

• Microsoft .NET Services which are service-based implementations of familiar .NET Framework concepts such as workflow and access control

• Live Services for a consistent way for users to store, share and synchronize documents, photos, files and information across their PCs, phones, PC applications and Web sites

• Microsoft SharePoint Services and Microsoft Dynamics CRM Services for business content, collaboration and rapid solution development in the cloud

New singing game offers 40 songs spanning genres and decades from artists including Beyoncé, Lupe Fiasco, Nirvana and Rascal Flatts, and two wireless microphones, for $69.99.

Calling all shower singers, rush-hour traffic vocalists, wanna-be rappers, pop princesses and those with a country twang: “Lips,” the highly anticipated singing experience exclusively for Xbox 360 from iNiS Corp., will be available in mid-November 2008. Picture throwing a “Lips” party for your closest friends where everyone sings and grooves to a vast array of music backed by the original music video, lyrics and scoring. Not only can everyone sing along, but “Lips” is the only music video game that comes with two wireless motion-sensitive microphones, allowing the freedom to put on the ultimate performance. Your parties will never be the same!

All 40 songs on disc are ready to play right out of the box, and “Lips” delivers great tracks from a wide range of musical genres that will set the stage for evenings of fun and entertainment with friends and family.

Regardless of whether you consider yourself a singer or typically shy away from the microphone, there’s something for everyone in “Lips,” including the following:

• Party Games. “Lips” has a variety of gameplay modes that will appeal to the gamer in all of us and possibly spark a little competition, while allowing you to experience and interact with your music in fun, new ways:

• Kiss is the epitome of singing and flirting your way to a sweet reward, where duos who hit the notes and gestures together meet in the middle to share a kiss. Are you a match?

• Vocal Fighters appeals to the competitor in all of us by pitting singers in one-on-one competition to win the most fans and boot one another off the stage. It’s a sing-off!

• Time Bomb is a cooperative mode where players work together to perform well and stave off a time bomb. The clock is ticking!

• Music videos. “Lips” has a variety of engaging music videos that enhance the game outside the original videos included with most songs:

• Virtual Music Videos. The more you get into your performance, the better the video. An in-game virtual music video will enhance your performance because the screen will mirror your moves and the characters will lip-sync along with you.

• Custom Music Videos. These unique, quirky videos add a humorous element to your routine and provide a music video for songs that may not have one.

• Freestyle Mode. “Lips” also allows you to use digital rights management-free songs from your own music collection when singing or playing any of the Party Games. Sing along to your music collection and play up your gestures to add to your score, while a virtual music video accompanies your performance. It is as simple as plugging in your compatible MP3 player. Lyrics will not display for songs from your music collection. For a list of compatible music players, visit http://www.xbox.com/lips.

• Play along. In addition to using the two mics as instruments, four of your friends can join in using the standard Xbox 360 Controller and choose from a variety of percussion accompaniment to play along with the music in “Lips.”

• Download new songs. For those who like what they see and crave more, “Lips” will also have a regular flow of downloadable content available for purchase via the Xbox LIVE Marketplace, starting at game launch. Love Estelle’s “No Substitute Love”? It is there. You can get it and the latest tracks to continually update your “Lips” experience.

• Split parts. Co-op Mode in “Lips” is designed to more accurately reflect songs that feature multiple vocalists. This gameplay mode enhances the experience by showing the lyrics and melody to all parts, helping turn a singing duo into a professional act.

Be one of the first to see what’s new in Windows 7 and be among a select few to receive a pre-beta build of Windows 7. Join us as WinHEC 2008

Announcements
WinHEC 2008 is All About Deep Technical Insight into Windows 7
With over 140 technical sessions, panels, and chalk-talks, WinHEC will provide plenty of opportunities to connect in person and in depth with Windows engineers. WinHEC is designed to provide deep explorations of future engineering and business directions for PC and device hardware. We are making sure we have the right speakers to have meaningful conversations. The people who build and develop for Windows are working hard to make sure the talks are on target. They designed the code; they built the code; they tested the code. Having our core engineering team at the conference gives us an opportunity to have valuable dialogue with you.

Sessions Descriptions Now Available to Help You Plan
We have posted nearly all the session descriptions and titles and have a solid set of presentations to generate a good deal of discussion in the hardware community. Noteworthy topics include DirectX 11 graphics and 3D rendering, parallel programming and multi-core processors, green power management, multi-touch, sensor and location platforms, wireless USB, Netbooks, flash storage and biometrics. Some sessions won’t ever show up on the site because we’ll be unveiling some new capabilities and can’t talk about them yet. Build your own schedule with the sessions you want to attend by using the “Add to Calendar” link.

WinHEC Attendee Party at “Playground of the Stars” Boulevard3, Hosted by Windows 7
Join the Microsoft Windows 7 Team at the WinHEC Attendee Party on Thursday, Nov. 6 at Boulevard3, the former site of the Hollywood Athletic Club. This party is not to be missed - plenty of fun for everyone and a great place to relax and talk to colleagues. For three decades, the Hollywood Athletic Club was revered as the “playground of the stars.” An exclusive retreat for the famous, founders Cecil B. DeMille, Charlie Chaplin, and Rudolph Valentino entertained such members as Errol Flynn and Tyrone Powers in its heyday.

The Windows 7 team invites you to a night of casino games, X-box, and more. Come to play Blackjack and Craps or simply to relax and connect with colleagues. Join in or watch the Texas Hold’em tournament (limited to 200 players). Your winning chips may be turned in for a chance to win fabulous prizes! Continuous shuttles will be provided from WinHEC hotels.

Watch Election Night Coverage by MSNBC at Welcome Reception on November 4
Join the WinHEC sponsors, exhibitors, your peers, and Microsoft staff and speakers for a special WinHEC Welcome Reception that includes election night coverage by MSNBC. Enjoy great food and drinks while you check out the products, services, and technologies that will advance the Windows hardware platform. This is a great opportunity to network and make important connections with your peers.

Decision to join AMQP Working Group based on commitment to openness, interoperability and providing customer choice.

Microsoft Corp. today announced that it is joining the Advanced Message Queuing Protocol (AMQP) Working Group, an organization focused on the development of the AMQP specification. Microsoft is joining the AMQP Working Group at the request of its members, including several of Microsoft’s customers in the financial services industry, in order to support the development of an open industry standard for ubiquitous messaging.

AMQP is a specification for platform-neutral, open standards-based business messaging. The primary goal of AMQP is to enable the communications necessary for business processes. AMQP Working Group members are collaborating on specifications for messaging infrastructure that provide businesses with a simple and more powerful way of connecting messaging-dependent applications both within and between firms. By joining the AMQP Working Group, Microsoft is seeking to contribute toward the development of such solutions and to enable greater customer choice in the marketplace.

“Customers are seeking scalable solutions with lower costs that will allow messaging within the enterprise and outside the corporate infrastructure,” said Sam Ramji, senior director of platform strategy at Microsoft. “By joining the AMQP Working Group, Microsoft is aiming to contribute to the development of the specification in ways that will best promote interoperability for existing market implementations and provide customers with increased choice.”

Message-based transports with security and transactional integrity are a vital infrastructure component throughout institutions. As Microsoft continues to provide vertical industry solutions, AMQP will provide an alternative to current messaging options. The AMQP specification and related implementations may provide greater interoperability for a number of vertical scenarios in addition to financial services, insurance and healthcare, among others.

AMQP Working Group members embraced the news of Microsoft’s decision to join.

“The AMQP Working Group is doing great work to facilitate open and interoperable standards for messaging infrastructure across platforms,” said Adrian Kunzle, head of Engineering and Architecture at J.P. Morgan. “We welcome Microsoft’s commitment as another step toward AMQP becoming the preferred connectivity for business messaging on the Internet.”

“Cisco has long been a proponent of open industry standards that benefit our customers,” said Pranta Das, technical leader for Cisco Systems Inc. and member of the AMQP Working Group. “We are pleased to welcome Microsoft to the AMQP Working Group as we continue to develop open specifications for messaging.”

Research shows less travel, more time at home for 2008 Holiday Season. Some tips on how families can stay connected and make their home time fun for everyone.

With economic turbulence in the headlines every day, people are getting back to the basics — eating out less, driving less, even shopping at thrift stores. How will this affect the holiday season? A new study conducted by StrategyOne Research and commissioned by Microsoft may provide a glimpse into how people’s plans are shaping up two months out.

According to the study, two out of three Americans admit they will consider spending less money on family and friends this year than they did last year. A vast majority — 81 percent — of adults in households with children are interested in gifts that provide family and friends with entertainment while staying home. Seventy-four percent of those households are also looking for electronics this year.

“Shoppers want to give their family and friends gifts this holiday season that are fun, and can be used daily by the whole family,” says Craig Beilinson, Director of Marketing, Entertainment & Devices Division. “Our research suggests that nearly half of families out there are considering one large family gift as opposed to many smaller individual items. There is a real renewed emphasis on that family experience.”

What kinds of gifts can meet those criteria, while still giving families new ways to stay connected? According to Seattle-based Windows Guru Rohit Rohila, integrated technologies and devices across Microsoft platforms provide more options than ever when it comes to staying in touch, sharing experiences, and finding new ways to have fun spending quality time at home.

Windows Gurus are retail associates specially trained by Microsoft to help people understand which technology products can best provide the features and functions they’re looking for. Gurus focus on creating a personal experience to help customers get the most from their technologies.

“The questions that retail associates have asked traditionally are ‘how much do you want to spend’ and ‘what brand’,” says Rohila. “We ask customers what they want to do with their computers and devices. Are they interested in recording TV programs on their PC? Are they into games or music? Then based off their answers, we help them find a gift geared toward those needs.”

The teaching fellows for Computer Science 50: “Introduction to Computer Science” each received a free tablet PC laptop from the Microsoft Corporation last Tuesday—a donation valued at more than $70,000 in total.

The computers—which the TFs will be allowed to keep for personal use once the course is over—are one of several corporate donations engineered by the course’s instructor, David J. Malan ’99.

Malan said the computers will help the TFs with grading, which he said has always been one of the most time-consuming aspects of their job.

“My hopes were to do whatever we could to optimize that process so TFs could focus their time more on the teaching aspect rather than the minutia of adding or subtracting points,” Malan said. “Tablet PCs struck us as a wonderful opportunity technologically to chip away at what is otherwise a fairly laborious process.”

Malan said he reached out to representatives from Microsoft last spring.

According to Shafeen Charania, the director of marketing in Microsoft’s education product group, Microsoft agreed to donate a tablet PC to each of the course’s TFs “to facilitate better teaching outcomes and help students effectively visualize the concepts of computer science.”

Although the 30 tablet computers—Dell Latitude XT models, valued at $2,351 each on Dell’s Web site—only arrived this past week, the intial response has been positive.

“Our students submit PDFs of code and we can write comments on it,” said Peter H. Lifland ’10, one of the almost 30 TFs for the course. “It makes the grading process a lot faster.”

“It’s like when an English professor highlights or marks stuff,” said Kenneth A. Parreno ’11, another TF. “It helps us give a lot of feedback in a faster, more efficient way.”

Massive gets your ads in the game

WHY ADVERTISE IN VIDEO GAMES?

Gaming is one of the fastest growing global entertainment forms and presents unique marketing opportunities for brands targeting hard to reach consumers – specifically young adult males.

The latest developments in video game hardware and software deliver truly unique, ultra-immersive entertainment experiences (in high-definition, too).

Are you looking to connect with a large audience that is highly engaged and can be targeted to meet your needs?

WHY WORK WITH MASSIVE?

Massive pioneered the development of dynamic in-game advertising.

We know games and advertising and have been refining our process
for delivering advertising into games for nearly 3 years. We can
ensure your campaign makes the right connection with gamers.
More than 100 leading global advertisers have executed campaigns
with Massive.

Our technology and network model reaches your target audience across titles, genres and game platforms.

Your campaign connects with gamers wherever they are… in the world.

TYPES AND SPECS
Advertisers can utilize a broad range of ad units available across titles in the Massive Network.

Ad campaigns can be targeted to meet specific geographic needs and timing needs.

The dynamic technology allows for creative to be updated and changed as needed.

MASSIVE TECHNOLOGY

Designed by veteran engineers experienced in video games and online application software development, Massive’s technology is optimized so as not to impede the consumer experience, the game play or online performance. The Massive team works closely with game publishers and developers to ensure that advertising is only incorporated in areas appropriate given the unique nature of each game environment.

The client software is integrated into a video game when it is being developed. When a game with Massive software is played on a connected game platform, the game receives advertising from the Massive Ad Server. (see process chart in “Integration” tab.)

for Fast-Growing Healthcare IT Services Provider With Shot in the Arm From Microsoft Dynamics AX 2009

Microsoft Corp. today announced that Vitalize Consulting Solutions Inc. (VCS), a rapidly expanding healthcare IT services provider based in Kennett Square, Pa., and Reading, Mass., and serving hospitals and healthcare organizations across the U.S. and Canada, has selected Microsoft Dynamics AX 2009 to keep pace with growing demand and set up the company for future success.

Working with Microsoft Gold Certified Partner Computer Generated Solutions Inc. (CGS), VCS will roll out Microsoft Dynamics AX 2009 Financials, Professional Services Automation, AX Enterprise Portal and Human Resources modules to fully automate its financial accounting, project management and personnel operations. The Microsoft Dynamics AX 2009 modules will replace an assortment of point solutions riddled with manual processes, which the company has added incrementally over the past five years to cope with its rapid expansion from small startup to midsize organization.

Microsoft beat out competition from Salesforce.com Inc., SAP AG, Agresso and other rival vendors in a rigorous vetting process to land the lucrative contract. Microsoft Dynamics AX 2009 got the nod for the overall integration of the solution; the ability to address the breadth of VCS’s functional needs; its robust, scalable platform that allows for future growth; and sheer user-friendliness, giving employees ready access to critical data through a familiar, intuitive interface similar to Microsoft Office.

“Microsoft Dynamics AX 2009 will provide VCS with a completely integrated solution,” said Eric Egnet, chief information officer at VCS. “This will provide us with the access and agility we need to respond to our marketplace, service our customers and help grow our company.”

VCS also was drawn to the native integration of Microsoft Dynamics AX 2009 with its existing investments in Microsoft Office, including SharePoint, Excel, Exchange Serve and Outlook, plus Microsoft SQL Server. The company’s installed base of Microsoft productivity applications will give its employees an easy point of entry into Microsoft Dynamics AX 2009 capabilities.

Released in June, Microsoft Dynamics AX 2009 is a comprehensive business management solution for midsized and larger organizations that enables fast-growing organizations to streamline processes, pare costs, identify and capitalize on business opportunities, monitor performance, and, thanks to innovative new roles-based functionality, maximize individual employees’ productivity.

Remarks by Craig Mundie, Chief Research and Strategy Officer, Microsoft Corp., University of California, BerkeleyBerkeley, CA

Craig Mundie’s speech, in part:

Partly the way I’ve done that ever since I came to Microsoft was to try to build some strategic prototypes that in the vein of a picture’s worth a thousand words, some prototype that allows you to suspend disbelief a little bit and dream with us about what the future might be like is a powerful thing to do, and I have a group of people that come together to try to assemble those, and I’ve put one of those together for you today.

I wanted to pick a topic that would allow me to thread together many of the current topics and future topics in computer science, but present them to you in a context that would be not just the science itself but in an application of it, and so I chose education.

It’s an area, of course, that you’re all involved in one way or another as either a teacher or a learner or both, and yet I think it’s an area where the planet has a big problem. I mean, today we have only about 1.5 billion people who really have any access to these advanced information technologies, another 5 billion people who really would love to have access but we haven’t found any effective way to give it to them.

I think doing that is going to be very important, because I don’t think that there is any scalable way to take the rich world concepts of health care, education or improved productivity and translate them into that environment. Even in the United States, the richest country in the world today, although getting poorer — (laughter) — we have a tough time finding a way to finance universal health care just for Americans. So, the idea that we would find a way to finance it for 5 billion more people, even if we had all the other rich countries participating, is just a practical impossibility.

So, I think that the root of the solutions in many of these areas is, in fact, to couple high volume consumer electronics-type manufacturing with much more sophisticated computers and software, and we’re really at a threshold where I think that may be possible in the relatively near future.

Update builds on momentum behind software-powered unified communications and voice.

Today, Microsoft Corp. debuted Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007 Release 2 (R2), an update to the award-winning Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007. Microsoft representatives demonstrated the new release for the first time before an audience of telecom and IT professionals at the VoiceCon tradeshow in Amsterdam. Customers will be able to purchase the release, currently in private beta testing, beginning in February 2009.

Office Communications Server 2007 R2 delivers important new functionality that extends software-powered voice, particularly for remote and mobile workers; provides on-premise audioconferencing to help reduce operational costs; and introduces new developer advances, including the ability to build communications-enabled business processes. These enhancements will improve business communications through a unified infrastructure and user experience.

“Office Communications Server 2007 R2, debuting just one year after the Microsoft unified communications launch, highlights the pace of innovation that is possible with software,” said Stephen Elop, president of the Microsoft Business Division at Microsoft. “This new release puts Microsoft on a rapid path to deliver voice software that does much more than a network private branch exchange (PBX) and with much less cost.”

Customers worldwide are embracing Microsoft’s unified communications platform, which streamlines communications by combining e-mail, instant messaging, conferencing and voice communications onto a single, unified platform.

Software-Powered Voice for Today and Tomorrow

Since the solution became available in 2007, businesses have begun migrating their workers off their PBXs to Office Communications Server for all their telephony needs. Customers such as Royal Dutch Shell plc are already taking a load off their PBXs by using Office Communications Server and Microsoft Office Communicator 2007 for mobile and remote workers in place of PBX phones to provide global employees with innovative communications solutions to quickly and efficiently reach their colleagues and help reduce operational costs.

Underlining Microsoft’s status as a leading innovation company, a new report by the European Commission ranks Microsoft as the top global investor in research and development (R&D).

Microsoft has been ranked as the No. 1 global investor in R&D by the European Commission’s 2008 EU Industrial R&D Investment Scoreboard report. The Scorecard is published less than two weeks after Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer’s visit to Europe (29 September to 3 October), where he highlighted Microsoft’s long and productive research and development relationship with Europe.

The European Commission Scorecard reported that Microsoft’s R&D investments exceeded €5.58 billion in 2007, showing a 14.6 per cent year on year increase, significantly outstripping the global average of 9 per cent.

“Microsoft sees Europe as a critical innovation resource, central to its global R&D strategy, and has an expanding network of more than 40 research and development facilities in 19 EU nations. Announcing significant new Microsoft R&D investments in Europe on 2 October Ballmer said, “To compete in a global, innovation-driven economy, we need to draw on the talent and skills of the world’s smartest, most creative minds. Increasingly, we are turning to Europe to find the talent we need. With 2,000 scientists, engineers, and developers, Europe has Microsoft’s largest concentration of R&D staff outside the United States.”

The report looks at R&D investment data from 2,000 participating companies’ own accounts over the 2007/8 financial year.